How to upgrade talent, develop & train your troops?
We did not have an ongoing training or staff development program for the creative corps when I was at JWT. And I doubt they do now. Which is a shame. Because everyone can use a refresher course on branding theory, or an update on the latest DRTV techniques, or explore new ways to trigger ad ideas.
By the time I was hired at Capital One, I had developed my own training program, based on AdCracker CD. The way it worked, I set aside two hours a week, 11:00 to 1:00 every Wednesday, with lunch courtesy of the shareholders. I included the production and admin folks as well as the creative teams. We covered everything from creative briefs to branding. And I spent a lot of time exploring new ways to get ideas.
In 4 to 6 weeks the entire company noticed an improvement in the quality and quantity of ideas coming from the creative department.
Your thoughts, experiences on training and staff development?
By the time I was hired at Capital One, I had developed my own training program, based on AdCracker CD. The way it worked, I set aside two hours a week, 11:00 to 1:00 every Wednesday, with lunch courtesy of the shareholders. I included the production and admin folks as well as the creative teams. We covered everything from creative briefs to branding. And I spent a lot of time exploring new ways to get ideas.
In 4 to 6 weeks the entire company noticed an improvement in the quality and quantity of ideas coming from the creative department.
Your thoughts, experiences on training and staff development?
Tags: creative, development, staff, training
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Kurt Beren Geiger on -
Hmmm... Now I'm not a CD, but the most valuable "training" I've had is on-the-job, but out-of-the-office. I’m talking about stuff like client meetings, PPM's, shoots and studio time.
JWT Germany has a staff educational program, but to be honest, I always felt it was more beneficial for the account and support people than for us on the creative side.
Seeking creative stimulus and keeping an eye on what's happening in our industry and what your clients’ competition are doing is what I consider to be an integral part of my job. How to do that may be worth a seminar for those tenured dinosaurs who don’t know how to do it in today’s online world, but I can’t imagine any one of them would admit that by actually taking part... ;)
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Permalink Reply by brian batong on
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I think it was in mid-1995 that I last experienced a formal training module for our Creative Dept. back then. Since then, I have been using a "Midweek Rumble" afterwork gab for the dept. (I found a correalation of brain outburts if it's on a Wednesday rather htan a Friday or a Monday, which is mostly positive). Of course, funky food and some beer will help.
Now, it still works. Most of the time.
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Permalink Reply by Ted Page on -
Interesting idea. Do you do your Midweek Rumbles at the office, or do you bring the staff out to a bar or restaurant? How to you show people that their ideas matter?
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Permalink Reply by Julie Noble on
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I worked somewhere for years where they didn't "believe" in training programs. They wouldn't even let people go downtown to trade association meetings, they were so paranoid we would be recruited elsewhere! Some of our better efforts were bringing our outsourced, professional copywriters into the business for a day's "workshop" about direct marketing (mail). After that, I think home-grown training sessions were most effective. Send some managers to a one-day course (Careertrack??) on adult education and training techniques (Train the Trainer workshops) so they know how to make it inclusive, otherwise your managers will just lecture their newbies. A Train-the-Trainer workshop shows them how to repeat key items and how to turn them into little hands-on exercises so some useful material is really well transmitted. I created one on headlining. Another on positioning. Junior marketers were always like SPONGES for know-how.
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Permalink Reply by Leslie Ehm on
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Over the past decade, there's been a TERRIBLE dirth of training for advertising people. Back in the day, CDs had time to mentor and train in house but those days are long gone. Today, we're all GO GO GO. And if we do get training, its from some shmuck who's used to training IBM sales guys. That's why my partner (Joan McArthur - ex CD O&M (L.A), McCann Erickson (Toronto), & Wells Rich Greene (L.A)) and I started our training company - 27 Marbles Training. Our workshops address the kind of issues that are real to our specific challenges and needs and help make the entire team capable of kicking ass so that its not just about rock stars and bench players. Because let's face it - no one is teaching in house anymore. We all learn the hard way and inevitably inherit the bad habits, templates and cheap tactics of the ones who came before us. Check us out. And ASK for training in your organization. Otherwise, your leaders will swear blind that you don't want it.
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Permalink Reply by Sergey Kornev on -
I work at a transcreation an insight agency. Due to a number of factors we do not have an itergrated staff development programms. These factors come from all over the chain, from unstable external enviroment to the size of the organisation.
As the industry becomes more competitive, an agency has to have a clear strategy of ensuring that this agency is different from others. Apart from being different an agency has to ensure that it maintains its individuality i.e. keeps things what makes it different. Thirdly, it has to stay consistent with it self. This is where people come in. To implement this strategy organisation has to see how their people are driving their business. I think this is the absolute key.
Staff development programm is a long term investment. It brings a number of advantages. I think one of the main ones is that it ensures that a group of people will have a consitent direction of thinking. Through these trainings people can learn the "language" of this agency. In the long run this will contribute to an increase of the brand value and etc.
It is also importnat to mention things like motivation and retention. Different training programmes create a new challenge and an opportunity to learn and achieve. A person should never stop learning and do the same task over and over, otherwise after a while a person will lose his/her drive and that is a disaster! Retention prevents excess of new-person-risk. Naturaly everyone wants to keep thier best people. If a person is facing a dead-end, doesn't see an opportunity to grow and learn new horizons - this person is lost. Either he/she will go or become a reactive robot with no drive.
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